At the ceremony attended by Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, construction of a new cogeneration unit at existing combined heat and power plant (CHPP) Zagreb, an investment worth some 121 million euros, has been lunched.
The new, high efficiency unit, with installed capacity of 150 MW of electricity and 114 MW of thermal energy is the largest single investment of the state-owned power utility HEP in new production facilities in the last 10 years. The expected average annual output of the new unit is 675 GWh of electricity (enough to meet the needs of around 200,000 households), 450 GWh of heating energy for Zagreb’s district heating system and 160 GWh of industrial steam.
Thanks to its most modern Siemens technology of combined cogeneration, the new unit will save up to 25 % of primary energy from natural gas. Also, once its old and inefficient units are decommissioned, CHPP Zagreb will emit considerably less carbon dioxide and other pollutants.
The project will be financed through loans granted by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the European Investment Bank (EIB), with guarantees having been provided by the European Fund for Strategic Investments, the main platform of the European Commission’s Investment Plan for Europe.
PM Plenkovic said that this was yet one more major investment in the national energy system, expressing satisfaction that, in line with the national energy strategy, HEP’s activities were directed at renewable energy sources.
HEP’s CEO Frane Barbaric said that the investment would bring multiple benefits, notably for 80,000 residents of the western part of Zagreb, who in the long run would obtain a safer source of heating. He reminded that this is HEP’s biggest but not only investment in power plants in this year. Other investments include Kastelir solar power plant in Istria, which has already been put into operation, construction works on solar power plant on Vis island are nearing completion, as well as work on the Korlat wind farm. Three solar power plants will be built on the island of Cres and preparations for the construction of a solar power plant near Vrlika are ongoing.
All projects, including the one at CHPP Zagreb, are part of HEP’s scenario of development of renewable energy sources, as part of which power plants with the capacity of 1,500 MW will be built until 2030.
